Chandigarh: The Haryana Police has told the Punjab and Haryana High Court that they have added a gangrape charge to the FIR filed in the case of possibility of rapes at Murthal during Jat stir in February.

The move is significant as the Haryana government and police had first denied that any sexual assault took place during the Jat stir demanding quota in government jobs.

Submitting a report by way of an affidavit filed by Mamta Singh on Monday, Inspector General of Police, South Range-cum-incharge, Special Investigation Team (SIT), the state police have included Section 376-D (rape) of the Indian Penal Code to the FIR No. 118 registered on March 30 this year regarding the incidents at along National Highway No 1 (NH-1) near Murthal in Haryana's Sonepat district.

The section has been included on the basis of complaint of Delhi resident Bobby Joshi that women were allegedly sexually assaulted by the agitators. The state government said it had received anonymous letters alleging that the rapes took place.

In February this year, the Haryana government had emphatically told the High Court that no such incidents of rape or molestation were reported from Sonepat district during the Jat agitation. The government had submitted a status report in the high court following investigations into the mass gangrape allegations by an all-women SIT it had instituted.

The SIT claimed no victim of the alleged mass gang rape or molestation had come forward.

The High Court, taking suo motu notice of the reports in the media about the mass gangrapes, had asked the Haryana government and police to submit a status report and had appointed lawyer Anupam Gupta as amicus curiae.

The High Court also questioned Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar’s government on the appointment of the Parkash Singh Committee to look into the incidents of violence during the Jat agitation, asking it to clarify its constitutional and legal status.

At least 30 people were killed and over 320 injured in the nine-day long Jat agitation for reservation.